The School Garden
by lizzyclaire
Summary: Like a garden has a collection of flowers, here is a collection of stories. Some that you just might find in the back school yard where Teru and Kurosaki work.
1. Table Of Contents

**The School Garden – Table of Contents **

I got this idea from Jaylea Nyx Felesian because she first had it in her story, so thank you for giving me the idea of using a table of contents. This is where all of the chapters in this one-shot collection will be along with their summaries, and will be updated as I put up each chapter.

* * *

><p><em><span>1. Marionette:<span>_

Kurosaki reflects on how hiding behind 'Daisy' has its good parts and bad parts, and how it impairs him when he tries to protect Teru.

_2. The Man Who Can't Be Moved:_

When Teru goes missing, Kurosaki is determined to wait for her, no matter how long it takes.


	2. Marionette

Marionette. That was what he would like to think of himself as, with Souichirou up in heaven somewhere pulling his strings. That was how it had been ever since the job of 'Daisy the Protector' had been bestowed upon him after all, binding him to his best friend's little sister in hopes that he could help her along her way in life after her brother was no longer there with her. When at first he had already assumed the limitations that would come with his new tasks, as he went along with his appointed duties, he quickly found even more that he hadn't even expected.

One of the most important ones presented itself to him one night when he was eating at Flower Garden, talking to Master at the same time about things mostly consisting Teru, his servant, and the girl he had sworn to watch over. The problem presented itself in a text message, making his phone vibrate in his pocket, and then once he read it, causing furry to well up inside of his heart.

"Damn it! And I just warned him!" He exclaimed to no one in particular, slamming his fist against the bar at which he sat, and causing his drink to nearly tip over due to the tremor which it caused. He was on his feet in an instant, but though he longed to go and fix the problem presented to him in the text, he could do nothing, and remained at the bar with his head drooping in frustration.

The black phone was snatched out of his hands then by the all too concerned Masuda, allowing him to read the message that Teru had just sent. "A thief!" He yelled once he was finished learning that a person had broken into the high schooler's apartment and trashed it, leaving her alone and scared.

"That bastard, he was targeting Teru from the start." The blond murmured, as ways to murder Takeda, the man that was intent on getting information from the girl, and the prime suspect at the time, flashed through his mind, none of them being something that he wasn't angry enough to do. "No…we don't have proof that he did it." He then reprimanded himself out-loud, trying to get his mind off of its current subject and on to what was more important at the time.

Master then did that with his next comment though, even if it was only to get knocked down in the end. "Forget about that! Teru is more important now! Go over-"

"I can't..." Kurosaki cut him off, placing his hand that wasn't in a fist on the table on the stool that he had been sitting on moments before, so that he would have more support when the revelation that he could do nothing suddenly came crashing down on him in full force. "The one who gets the mail is Daisy, not me. If I went there…" The tall man didn't finish the sentence, but both knew what would happen. Suspicions would rise, and at least one of them wasn't sure if they would be able to come up with enough lies quick enough to cover up what they did if they were to help.

"Idiot! This isn't time to be thinking of something like that!" The other protested, voicing what was on his mind while managing to add in an insult even in the pressing situation. "Just pretend you need something and call her!"

"I never asked for her number!" Another wall came up in the two men's way every time they came up with a new idea then, though they seemed to grow more frantic with each passing minute.

"Damn!" The one behind the bar yelled. "Just use 'I was walking by' as an excuse!"

"Can't you come up with a more natural excuse?" The other one demanded of his friend, feeling as if he was about to cry as through his head, pictures of what the poor girl that they both so desperately wanted to help had to have been going through while he just stood there and did nothing. "Damn it…why am I thinking of excuses at this time?" He then cursed himself, lifting a hand to grip at his supposedly bleached hair as he felt like pulling a few strands out himself. "There's no choice now, I'll just have to go there…" He said, making up his mind to simply offer Teru his help and then deal with problems as they came, when the door to the restaurant suddenly swung open, reveling a teary-eyed girl in her uniform that had just been through more than she would ever had liked to experience.

"Ah…You really are here Kurosaki." She said, taking a few steps closer to the man that she was more familiar with then she knew at the time.

Said man regarded her with pained eyes, something that he didn't bother to cover up now with tears beginning to spill out of the petite girl's large, innocent hazel eyes. "A thief broke into my house. The whole place is a mess; even the bed sheets got shredded." She explained her predicament to him. "I'm really scared… Even though I sent Daisy a mail, he didn't show up… Then, I don't know why…but I came here…" Her tale ended once Kurosaki pulled her into his arms, unable to bear standing still while Teru wept in front of him any longer.

"It's alright." He comforted her as salt water began to seep into the fabric of his shirt, though it wasn't as if he minded in the least, what with more important things currently weighing on his mind. "Everything is okay now, so no need to be afraid anymore. Everything is alright…" Kurosaki swore then, that even if everything wasn't really alright at the time, he would _make _it alright, because that was what he was there to do. He no longer had any other purpose on the earth besides protecting the girl that he currently held, so he would do that one thing with all of his might.

But then, wasn't his problem that he couldn't always protect Teru with all of his might? Creating the name Daisy for him to hide behind had had its advantages in the end, mostly for the fact of protecting Kurosaki's identity and keeping Teru in the dark for as long as the sun would refuse to come up and reveal the truth. But then, it also limited him in ways that someone wouldn't expect unless they knew just how much danger that someone was in. Because the sister of Souichirou knew that Daisy would save her, that was who she went to in times of trouble, not knowing that the very slave driver that she put up with at school was the one behind the empty figure that was the bridge between them, connecting them.

This is what bound him in practically everything that he did; only allowing him to go so far as he tried his best to get closer to Teru, and whisk her away from the cruel world that they both resided in. And every time that he strained against what bound him just out of her reach, the shackles to which only she held the key would bite into his skin, producing a pain that he was unable to avoid no matter how many different ways that he tried to get around it. But he knew, these shackles were placed on him for a reason, and every time he fought them he tried to figure it out.

Why were shackles placed on him if the puppet strings controlling him were the ones pushing him to try and break free?

* * *

><p><strong>So, just something I thought up when I was listening to Everybody's Fool by Evanescence. I hope you enjoyed, and in case anyone was wondering, this scene was from chapter 4 of the Dengeki Daisy manga. I got the dialog off line instead of from my volume, so if you don't read it online it may be different from what you've read, but I'm not sure.<strong>


	3. The Man Who Can't Be Moved

"Hey, why don't you move?"

I turned my head around to stare questioningly at the brunette as she stood over me, watching me as I kneeled down to pull out the weeds in the flower bed littered with daisies. "Excuse me?" I questioned her.

Riko sighed, a tired look coming on to her face, but for reasons unknown to me. "There's no reason for you to stay here anymore, so why do it? Why don't you go get a better job somewhere and leave this place; I know it's filled with memories for you."

I had looked away from the tall woman halfway through her small speech, to stare, almost blankly, at the blue daisies dripping with moisture from the last time I watered them in front of me. "But why would I want to go away? And what about when Teru comes back? I have to be here, don't I? I can't very well leave her by herself. Who knows how much trouble that idiot would get herself into without me there to save her?"

"Tasuku…" There was a pause, and I knew Riko was looking at me just as everyone else did now; eyes full of pity, and a sad look on their face. I didn't know why they did it. Sure, Teru had gone missing, but she was going to come back to me, and I would stay put until she did. I mean, it wasn't that I hadn't been searching for her, because everyone had, but I couldn't just leave, not when she still might come back.

"No Riko!" I raised my voice at one of my oldest friends. "I can't leave, and you know that! What would happen if she came back and I wasn't here?"

There was another pause, and I held my breath. With everyone's stress so high in the current predicament we were in, it was easy for fights to quickly arise, and fighting with one of my coworkers in the school yard wouldn't be good for either of us. Finally she spoke, but instead of her voice being as loud as mine had been if not louder, it was small and quiet, almost sounding timid. "But…It's been six months."

I got up then, my long legs then making me taller than my companion. I struggled to keep my next words calm and even, not daring to look at her and keeping my blond hair in my face as I began to walk away. "Something as trivial as time shouldn't matter. I didn't expect it to last for only a week, even if that would have been nice."

As I quickly retreated to another part of the school, I felt Riko's eyes on my back, once again filled with pity.

* * *

><p>I didn't avoid Riko all day, for it was an impossible task to accomplish, especially with her living next door. Now she even came over to my house for dinner, cooking for me and clearly taking care to watch over me. I didn't know why she did, because I was clearly fine, because Teru was coming back.<p>

That night though, I locked myself in my room after dinner, not feeling up to small talk and wanting time to myself to think. Riko was in the other room watching some shoujo anime, so I thought it best to leave her alone during that as well.

I hadn't even made it to my bed when I heard a knock at the front door. I considered going to answer it, but then thought better of it, deciding to let Riko get it and just listen in on what was going on.

"Oh, Master, Andy, what are you doing here?" I heard Riko's voice, filled with surprise as the door clicked open.

"There's something we need to talk to you about. Is Tasuku here?" Andy's voice was grave, and I leaned back against the door in my dark room to better hear what they had to say.

"Yea." Riko answered, her voice slightly confused from the sad face Andy must have been making due to how it showed in simply his voice. "He's sleeping in his room. Should I go get him?"

"No, if he's sleeping, this is something that I'd hate to interrupt him with. We should let him be; but Riko, you might want to sit down for this." I listened as footsteps sounded across my apartment floor, and they all sat down around my dining room table.

"What is it?" The woman inquired after they had sat down, and there was a pause before Andy answered, as I assumed he was preparing himself for what he was about to say.

"They found Teru's body." Riko gasped, and I myself do the same, quickly covering my mouth with my hand. There was no way that they could have heard me just now, but I left it there in case of any other noises that I might make later on. Suddenly my legs felt as if they couldn't hold me up anymore, and I slid down the door into a sitting position on the floor, leaning my weight against the thick wood. "She was in the river near the walking path, you know, the one where Tasuku found Takeda's dog. Time of death's been estimated to around six months ago."

Salt water began to trickle out of my eyes as I felt nausea roll in my stomach, and I took deep, gasping breaths to try and calm myself down. I knew that Riko was crying too when I heard how she spoke her next words with a wavering voice, as if it might break at any moment. "Poor Teru…Who do you think did it?"

"We're not sure. It could have been anybody. You know how many people were after her." That was the first time that Master had spoken since entering my home, and I knew then that he was crying as well. The past tense that he had used though caused me to flinch, and the first sob came, broken, from my chest. I felt as if everything was suddenly crumbling around me, as the last thing that had been holding me together had vanished.

"How are we going to tell Tasuku?" The counselor asked after a heavy moment of silence. "God…Teru was his everything. You saw how in denial he was about even the possibility of her not coming back to him. What's he going to do, how's he going to act once he knows that she's dead?" Riko choked on the last word, but I honestly couldn't have expected her not to. First her boyfriend dies, and now his little sister, who she had considered her own, is dead as well.

"I honestly don't know." Andy answered, only to add to the irony of the situation, as little did they know, I had already found out, and was in the process of sobbing my heart out right under their noses. "But let's let him be for now. I really would hate to wake him up just to tell him that she's gone." Agreements came from the other two, before Master ushered everyone out of my apartment, saying that they should leave me in peace, and promising free drinks for them at Flower Garden to make everyone feel better. I silently thanked Master for that, as it was becoming increasingly difficult to hold back the noise of my cries.

I waited until I heard the door finally close before removing my hand from my mouth, no longer blocking out any noise that I was to make. I didn't move from my spot as I cried, if anything I put more of my weight against the door, as I was unable to hold myself up in any way anymore. It seemed like all of the energy had been drained out of me, and all that I could do was cry. I had no purpose anymore anyways, as the one thing that I had bent my life around was gone.

If someone saw me at that moment, or even anytime after that, they would call me broken. But that wasn't true, because in no way did I consider myself anywhere near broken. That was because I was shattered. I had fallen into a multitude of tiny bits and pieces, so that there was no way, no matter how much time you spent, to put me back together. That was why I knew that next time I saw any of my friends, they would know that I already knew about Teru, because how were you supposed to hide it, when something as all important as your heart, couldn't ever be fixed again.

* * *

><p><strong>So, I wrote this forever ago, and I the only reason that I even remember at what time I wrote this was because it was around the time I started going out with my boyfriend. :P Weird, huh? I feel like my writing style has gotten better, but I'm worried that if I try to change the story I'm just going to mess it up, so though the idea wasn't that bad, I don't really like the way I wrote it…..oh well! Please review anyway and tell me what you think!<strong>


End file.
